While traditional SimCity games are billed as “city-building simulators”, SimCity Societies focuses more on your city’s population and their needs as a society.

Something that shapes the look an feel of your city is the political spectrum. As mayor if you implement a lot of authoritative policies, your city will look the part with secret police stations and early curfews . If your focus is business then your city will take on a capitalist tone with skyscrapers and department stores. If you like it liberal, your city will be able to have buildings like a game development company and a recycling center.

The gameplay mostly revolves around achieving city planning goals. You choose a level, then try to allocate city budgets to build the buildings you need to change city stats. Every structure in the game has some pros (in green) and cons (in red).

Most buildings have something positive to offer with a small downside, usually power draw. Some buildings are cheap but have bigger downsides like pollution or ugliness (stat-wise). You have to figure out which stats you need to bump, and then raise money and build building that will get you to where you need to be.

Time can be advanced ’till the end of the month, which is nice because I like to buy my buildings quick and get fresh tax money right away. Every couple of months there will be some sort of city “issue” that you as Mayor can solve. They present you with a couple of solutions and their costs and you have to choose which one you like. Your choice directs your city’s growth towards either liberal or authoritative styles.

I like how SimCity Societies has small levels with simple goals. I hate playing a mobile game for more than 15 minutes so this suits me just fine. The levels seem episodic because you’re never trying to solve the same problem twice, kind of like how scenarios work in classic SimCity.